Connectors for coaxial cable having hollow inner conductors are generally used throughout the semi-flexible coaxial cable industry. For example, Juds et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,046,451 describes a connector for coaxial cables having annularly corrugated outer conductors and plain cylindrical inner conductors. Van Dyke U.S. Pat. No. 3,291,895 describes a connector for cables having helically corrugated inner and outer conductors. A connector for a coaxial cable having a helically corrugated outer conductor and a plain cylindrical inner conductor is described in Johnson et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,199,061.
One of the problems with present techniques for making connections to hollow inner conductors of coaxial cables is that they are unable to compensate for variations in the size of the cable conductors due to manufacturing tolerances and the like. Another problem is non-uniform connections which lead to variations in the electrical zone lengths in the connections, which in turn leads to variations in the electrical performance characteristics, such as the VSWR, of the resulting connections.